a documental about the anarchists in argentina and uruguay in early XX century. who were and what were the thoughts of severino de giovanni and simón radowitzky? who was rosigna? the documentary begins showing the ushuaia prison, where radowitzky lived a lot of years after killing ramón falcón, chief of the federal police (who had killed a lot of workers during a manifestation). then, it goes to the arrival to buenos aires of thousands of italians, spanish and jewish immigrants, the origin of half the population of argentina and uruguay, between them the first anarchists and socialists of the river plate. nowadays can be curious to see that such idealists could attack a bank (sometimes killing people) and steal a lot of money only for editing books or pamphlets, as their lives went on in a pathetic material poverty. it is interesting to see how was planned the escape of anarchists from punta carretas prison of montevideo. one anarchist settled a coal shop in front of the prison, and a tunnel was dug from there to prison. some decades before, there was a flight of tupamaros prisoners in the same way. the anarchists were defeated by militar dictatorships and because the appearing of peronism in 1946 (the creol working class had less contact with european political ideas). di giovanni was executed in prison, radowitzky after being put free fought in the spanish civil war, rosigna was put free in Uruguay but “disappeared” (killed indeed). perhaps there are few emphasis in the origin of their ideals and the difference between the pacifists and violent ways they employ for fighting. the testimony of anarchist writer osvaldo bayer, a niece of rosigna, a former tupamaro and old anarchists contribute to have a wider viewpoint.

“bastards of utopia” is an inspiring story of militant creativity and invention. what can you do when the global cycle of struggles is in decline? how can you confront the fact that strategies of action and models of organization developed elsewhere just don’t work here? experiment, these activists tell us, experiment relentlessly until you discover through the brambles a path forward.

there are other ways. commerce, capital, and consumption are by no means irrevocable necessities in today’s world. in their angry and rousing documentary “noise and resistance”, francesca araiza andrade and julia ostertag show that those who think so are not alone in this opinion. what some would describe as mere din and nuisance, they prove to be a vital articulation of resistance :here punk is neither a passing fad nor a dusted relic from the past but the lively expression of an attitiude towards life.

the directors enter the centres of a vivid and vibrant, a rebellious and self-conscious scene. be it squatters in barcelona, anti-fascists in moscow, dutch trade unionists, the activists of england’s crass collective, queer trailer park inhabitants in berlin, or swedish girl punk bands, their music always expresses a collective self-assertion, a no! set to music whose slogan : do it yourself! has become a strident 21st century “international”.

“noise and resistance” is an inspiring journey through europe’s contemporary utopia, to subcultural places of desire where unity derives from autonomy along with the best punk sound you’ve heard for years.

Thirty years of “crisis,” mass unemployment, and flagging growth, and they still want us to believe in the economy. . . . We have to see that the economy is itself the crisis. It’s not that there’s not enough work, it’s that there is too much of it.
—from The Coming Insurrection

The Coming Insurrection is an eloquent call to arms arising from the recent waves of social contestation in France and Europe. Written by the anonymous Invisible Committee in the vein of Guy Debord—and with comparable elegance—it has been proclaimed a manual for terrorism by the French government (who recently arrested its alleged authors). One of its members more adequately described the group as “the name given to a collective voice bent on denouncing contemporary cynicism and reality.” The Coming Insurrection is a strategic prescription for an emergent war-machine to “spread anarchy and live communism.”

Written in the wake of the riots that erupted throughout the Paris suburbs in the fall of 2005 and presaging more recent riots and general strikes in France and Greece, The Coming Insurrection articulates a rejection of the official Left and its reformist agenda, aligning itself instead with the younger, wilder forms of resistance that have emerged in Europe around recent struggles against immigration control and the “war on terror.”

Hot-wired to the movement of ’77 in Italy, its preferred historical reference point, The Coming Insurrection formulates an ethics that takes as its starting point theft, sabotage, the refusal to work, and the elaboration of collective, self-organized forms-of-life. It is a philosophical statement that addresses the growing number of those—in France, in the United States, and elsewhere—who refuse the idea that theory, politics, and life are separate realms.